Famed food critic Keith Lee said Toronto was impressed and gave a rich rating to its culinary creators, as the first international stop on his latest food tour.
“Toronto might be one of the top three places we’ve been to on this food tour.” Lee stated in a video posted Sunday as he left town..
Lee, a Las Vegas-based food critic who has more than 16 million followers on TikTok, ventured to Toronto on his FamiLee Food Tour, after visiting Arizona, Indianapolis and Hawaii. They spent more than a week in Toronto driving around the city and its suburbs. unleash the “Keith Lee Effect” on local businesses.
After each of Lee’s visits, lines formed outside the institutions he praised. Wait times doubled for a shawarma place in Scarborough, while a small bakery in Ajax had to close just to prepare for the weekend rush, and a downtown pizzeria had to take a day to restock its supply exhausted.
“For this to be the first international food stop, I didn’t expect this reception, my jaw dropped,” Lee said as he summarized his time in Toronto and the business boom he left in his wake.
In the span of just over a week, Lee reviewed seven restaurants in the city. Here’s a look at how he ranked them:
Food critic Keith Lee visits Toronto and ranks it in the top three on his latest food tour.
To kick off the Toronto leg of Lee’s food tour, he started at a shawarma place in Scarborough, Ontario.
As for overall taste, Lee rated the chicken shawarma an 8.2 out of 10 and the beef shawarma an 8.4 out of 10, preferring the individual proteins to the mix of beef and shawarma wrapped in one.
“I feel like this will be one of our most interesting food tours yet,” Lee said.
Lee then headed to what he called a “super Canadian” bakery located in a backyard shed in Ajax, Ont.
While Lee said sweets aren’t his cup of tea, he gave the Korean Fluffy Caramel Latte an eight out of 10. “That’s unique. “It’s really good,” Lee said.
He rated the carrot cake with cream cheese frosting a seven and the banana bread a 7.2 out of 10.
“We’re definitely all in shock, overwhelmed, but we’re very excited to see what comes of this,” Victoria Fliegel, Biscuits to Baskets store manager, previously told CP24.
For his only stop in downtown Toronto, Lee visited a “very, very small” pizzeria, starting with some macaroni and cheese that earned a glowing 8.5 out of 10.
Lee gave a spicy honey pepperoni pizza with pickled jalapeno a 9 out of 10, while a samosa pizza got a 7.5 out of 10.
Lee left a $3,000 tip and another $1,000 for Afro’s Pizza to hand out free slices for the rest of the night.
“Once he left, we gave away free pizza to people for three hours,” owner Rodney Best told CP24 last week.
Lee, a self-proclaimed eggs Benedict connoisseur, rated this restaurant’s version of the classic breakfast dish a 7.7 out of 10.
For the waffles, dipped in a blueberry compote, with a tangy and smooth, buttery texture, Lee raised his rating to nine out of 10 for the brunch spot with locations in Toronto and Markham, Ont.
Tasting a dense stack of Earl Gray pancakes, Lee stated that he couldn’t taste the tea notes, but found the flavor “still really good,” giving it an 8.5 out of 10.
This Bahamian treasure earned the highest ranking on Lee’s list in Toronto.
“In my opinion, this [line] It should be outside the door. “This is the best food we’ve had since we got here,” Lee said.
For his first Bahamian dish, Lee took a dense, buttery pancake, slathered it with guava butter and fried snapper, and gave it a 9.6 out of 10. “I would wait two hours for this,” Lee said.
The fried chicken didn’t reach the same level of awesomeness and received a more generic 7 out of 10.
On the opposite end of the scale, Lee’s first and last stop in Jamaica earned the lowest rating on his trip to Toronto.
The visit got off to a strange start when an employee admitted she was hungover and initially ruined Lee’s order. After noting the problem with customer service, Lee gave the Jerk Chicken Sandwich a 6.5 out of 10, the Curried Goat Sandwich a 7.5 out of 10, and the Oxtail with Rice and Peas a 6.5 out of 10.
The idiot responded to Lee’s review with an apology on Instagram from the owner, who explained that he was out of town and promised to personally serve the reviewer the next time he’s in town.
Lee tried a traditional Somali dish, goat and rice, and gave it an 8.2 out of 10, acknowledging that it may not be to everyone’s taste.
The beef stew, which Lee said tasted “like meatloaf,” scored a solid 8 out of 10, while he rated the milkloaf an 8.5 out of 10 for flavor, but a 3.5 for texture.